Festivities (of a Sort)
by Misty Reeyus
Summary: The Kaitou Kid Capture Brigade meets on Christmas Eve. Or, how a semi-serious strategy session somehow turns into a sleepover.


Written for Poirot Cafe's Secret Santa Exchange 2016.

I realize this is a bit late to be a proper Christmas fic. Whoops.

* * *

Aoko was supposed to be hosting a Christmas party.

Evidently, it's an annual tradition: every Christmas Eve, she and Kuroba would invite all their classmates over to her house for a friendly get-together. Saguru wouldn't know, having only transferred to Ekoda recently, and now that he's no longer living with Mum in London, he'd actually expected his own Christmas this year to be a quiet, wholly unremarkable affair.

But of course, Kaitou Kid just had to waylay everyone's plans by releasing a heist notice yesterday night.

The notice claimed he would steal the Tear of Miracles, a large diamond owned by the reasonably wealthy Tsukasa Group, during it's display at the company's Christmas Day gala. In the face of this sudden new development, Aoko, as leader of the Kaitou Kid Capture Brigade, made her call: she begrudgingly cancelled her party so that she could host this critical team strategy meeting instead.

"Well I, for one, am glad the whole thing's off." Kuroba mumbles through his mouthful of fried chicken, interrupting Aoko's explanatory rant. "Like I told you, we were getting too old for Christmas parties anyway."

Aoko just sticks her tongue out at Kuroba before scooping up and then irritably crunching on a handful of potato crisps.

Koizumi giggles, clearly amused by the two's bickering, and helps herself to another slice of the classic Japanese Christmas Cake.

Saguru himself stares down at the assortment of junk food piled over his own plate as the four of them sit around the Nakamori's dinner table. He wouldn't call this a proper meal, but given that Aoko originally planned on entertaining a much more populous party, there are definitely more than enough snacks for four people to stuff themselves to the brim.

Saguru supposes it's as close to a Christmas feast as he'll get here in Japan. He finishes his food amidst the familiar, almost comfortable mix of Kuroba's cheeky remarks and Aoko's petulant moans and Koizumi's oddly enchanting laughter.

Afterwards, they set to work on the plans.

* * *

The plans are usually pretty useless, actually.

With Kuroba involved in their conception, they're bound to be, so Saguru treats these sessions where all four of them huddle around a set of blueprints on the floor as investigative more than cooperative. He tries to mitigate whatever sabotage Kuroba might enact, tries to grill Kuroba for information, and later, when Saguru's by himself, he has to think ahead and anticipates how the results of their strategy meeting will affect Kaitou Kid's movements the next day.

Still, Saguru likes to take as active a role as he can.

"Koizumi-san, you should stay in the ballroom," Saguru says, pointing at the corresponding spot on the diagram. "They'll keep the jewel displayed where guests can see it, so your job is to keep a close watch on both it and the crowd."

He's expecting it when she smirks confidently—he knows by now that she is most satisfied with roles in which she can dazzle the public, draw attention to herself—and so he's prepared to control the sudden spike in heart rate that comes as response to her smile. The feelings Koizumi elicits within him are still abnormal, and honestly somewhat unnerving, but Saguru's gotten much better at controlling his reactions since they first started working together.

"I'll watch the the east wing," Aoko offers, and Saguru nods.

"Then I'll take the west. Kuroba-kun, you'll have the roof."

Kuroba whines. "Awww man. Why can't I have the west wing?"

Saguru narrows his eyes suspiciously. "Why? What's so good about the west wing?"

Of course, this could all be a misleading ploy, a deceptive distraction meant to make him focus on something entirely irrelevant, but as far as Saguru's concerned, the more information he can squeeze out of Kuroba, the better. No matter if they be falsehoods or truths.

Kuroba just shrugs. "Nothing in particular. It's just that it'll be cold up on the roof." A half-baked excuse—is he even trying?

"You can layer up," Saguru states, but Kuroba doesn't back down, staring back at him defiantly. Even knowing that this is probably a foolish errand, Saguru stands his ground and glares right back; he is nothing if not determined in his detective work.

Finally, Kuroba sighs and yanks out a pack of playing cards from his pocket. "How about I play you for it? Classic rummy. Winner gets the position."

Saguru narrows his eyes. "You'll cheat if it's card games. Chess."

Kuroba makes a face. "Boooooring. Karuta?"

"That still counts as a card game."

Kuroba scrunches up his nose, clenching and reopening his fist so that the cards disappear and a pair of dice take their place. "Cho-han?"

"Dice can be rigged—"

"Enough, we're wasting time!" Aoko shouts, and the argument ceases instantly as Saguru realizes he almost let Kuroba drag him into something needlessly time-consuming and complicated. "You two, rock-paper-scissors, best two out of three. Go!"

They go. Saguru wins in the third round.

He can't tell whether or not Kuroba let him.

* * *

They're in the middle of discussing their escape prevention strategy when Saguru gets a throw pillow to the face.

Saguru has to take a moment to process that, staring blankly at the discarded cushion that bounced off his cheek and flopped onto the floor beside him, but he's snapped back to attention by familiar telltale snickering in his ears. Biting back a sigh, Saguru glances up from the blueprints and locks eyes with the culprit; Kuroba sits leaned up against the couch that is now adorned with two decorative cushions instead of three and counters Saguru's miffed glare with an insincere "Whoops."

Saguru grits his teeth but endeavors not to give Kuroba the satisfaction, shoving the pillow to the side and calmly returning to his assessment of the building layout.

Fifty-two seconds later, a second plush projectile nails him in the shoulder, and Saguru stiffens but otherwise doesn't react, still refusing to rise to the bait. This is honestly unlike Kuroba—he's normally cagey and uncooperative around Saguru, but he's never quite this intentionally, _openly_ irritating unless it's part of some larger objective.

"Kaito, knock it off!" Aoko scolds, and Saguru looks up again in time to see her smack Kuroba's shoulder.

The rebuke does nothing to discourage him, though. Grinning cheekily, Kuroba inches his hand up the couch, moving as if to grab the last pillow—but Aoko abruptly shoots her own arm out and snatches it first, then proceeds to whop Kuroba over the head with it.

Kuroba squawks, falling back on his hands and knees, but Saguru doesn't miss the way he smirks almost _victoriously_ as he then deftly scrambles over Saguru's side of the room. Snatching up one of the pillows he'd thrown at Saguru earlier, Kuroba lets loose a battle cry and flings it in Aoko's general direction.

The pillow completely misses Aoko, and Saguru's not sure whether that was intentional or not, because it hits Koizumi instead.

Everyone instantly freezes in place, as if someone pressed pause on the Nakamoris' living room. Tension clouds the air so abruptly that Saguru swears he can feel it pressing _physically_ down on him, and as Koizumi goes stock still, the other three keep their gazes glued to her in wordless apprehension.

Finally, with a perfectly pleasant smile on her face, Koizumi tilts her head down to stare at the pillow that's fallen into her lap, picks it up, and pounces so fast she _blurs_ in Saguru's vision.

The next thing any of them know, Koizumi is atop Kuroba, straddling his waist while he lies with his back to the floor. She must be far stronger than Saguru ever pegged her to be, because in spite of all his struggling, Kuroba can't seem to dislodge her, and Koizumi shoves her pillow into his face, smirking vengefully. Kuroba's shout of protest becomes a muffled sputter against the plush and Saguru nearly moves to stop Koizumi before he has a case of suffocation on his hands, but thankfully, she abandons that course of action first.

As soon as Kuroba can breathe again, Aoko immediately joins in by treating him to another whop over the head from her pillow.

"Hey! Two on one is cheating!" Kuroba shrieks, but his desperation is laced with laughter and his hands are valiantly fighting them off.

"You started this, Kuroba-kun," Koizumi drawls, tone sickly-sweet as she ruthlessly rubs her cushion into his hair. "Don't think you'll get off without punishment."

Kuroba whines and apparently changes his strategy, squirming and rolling onto his side as best he can beneath their assault. His hands abandon their pitiful defense in order to stretch out towards the last, discarded pillow that sits between Saguru and the nearby slaughter—a desperate attempt to arm himself.

Saguru grabs the pillow first, tosses it back across the room and onto the couch, and, ever so calmly, snatches up both of Kuroba's wrists. Relishing the look of utter betrayal on Kuroba's face, Saguru pins his hands to the floor so that Kuroba is utterly defenseless.

The girls don't stop until he's screaming mercy.

* * *

"So you're too old for Christmas parties, but not for pillow fights?"

Saguru manages to ask when he gets a moment alone with Kuroba, when Aoko excuses herself to go to the bathroom and Koizumi retreats to the dining room to get more snacks. Kuroba, in the process of rearranging the marker pieces on the map to suit their newest iteration of the plan, doesn't even look up as he responds, "What do you mean?"

Saguru crosses his arms. "You've been trying to distract us with games and diversions all night." And while yes, Kuroba is always at least a little disruptive during Capture Brigade strategy sessions, he's never been quite this fervent about it before. "Why?"

Kuroba just smiles. "You know, Aoko was really looking forward to her Christmas party."

"Yes. And Kid's heist ruined that for her." Saguru's tone is more than a little accusing.

"Well, maybe Kid didn't have a choice." Kuroba shrugs. "They announced that the jewel would only be displayed during that gala on Christmas Day. His window of opportunity is pretty small."

Saguru bites his lip. Implicitly, that might as well be Kuroba confessing to his identity, but explicitly, it's not nearly enough. It's nothing close to real proof.

"What's your point?"

"I just figure we all oughta try and have some fun today," Kuroba says noncommittally, then abruptly pushes himself to his feet and makes for the dining room. "I'm gonna go have more of that fried chicken."

Saguru stares after him, unsure what to think. Koizumi returns to the living room as Kuroba leaves it, half of a gyoza in her hand as she chews the other half in her mouth. She seems amused, and that's enough to let Saguru know she heard every word of their conversation.

"Stubborn, isn't he?" Koizumi remarks after she swallows, casually taking her seat again.

Saguru can only nod in agreement.

* * *

Somehow, they manage to come to a satisfactory conclusion.

The strategies are, of course, essentially forfeit since the Kaitou Kid himself is aware of them, but they manage to derive a decently workable, and more importantly, _flexible_ plan before midnight (eleven twenty-six and twenty-one point five seconds, to be precise). After they've triple-checked everything, Saguru is ready to call it a night, so he thanks Aoko for her hospitality and reaches back into his pocket so he can shoot Baaya a text to come pick him up…

His phone isn't there.

"Oh yeah, you dropped this earlier." Kuroba proffers the mobile in his sticky-fingered hand, and Saguru glares at the boldfaced lie as he snatches it back. "By the way, I told your housekeeper you're staying over tonight."

"You _what_?" Saguru glances through his text history— _how_ did Kuroba figure out his unlock password—and indeed, according to this, he sent Baaya a message telling her not to worry about getting him home. " _Why_?!"

Kuroba shrugs. "We still need your help finishing all the food."

A likely story.

Saguru bristles, but as he notices Aoko staring at him in concern and Koizumi watching with slight interest, he sighs and runs his fingers through his hair to calm himself down. He…supposes it's not a huge deal. It wouldn't be the first time a Capture Brigade strategy meeting turned into an overnight stay at the Nakamoris', and Saguru would feel bad about bothering Baaya now.

What's done is done.

Koizumi apparently needs no prompting to sleep over as well, so Kuroba conjures a deck of cards from who knows where and suggests a way for the four of them to pass the time. Saguru doesn't have it in him to protest, so they end up playing karuta after all.

Though, not without Saguru squeezing a promise out of Kuroba that there would be absolutely no foul play, cross his heart and hope to die.

It's a brief mini-tournament, in which Saguru faces Aoko in the very first round and gets knocked out almost embarrassingly quickly. Unsurprising, though, seeing as he's not nearly as acquainted with the game as his Japanese peers. He then referees for Koizumi and Kuroba's match, a fierce fight that leaves Aoko fixated like an extreme football fan and Saguru fearing for his own safety amidst the slapping of palms. It's a close match that Koizumi wins by a single point, and as the girls face each other in a final match that Kuroba oversees, Saguru actually manages to finish off the last of the fried chicken.

Aoko narrowly manages to triumph, which Koizumi takes with a surprising amount of grace. The victor doesn't once stop beaming as they all start getting ready for bed, as they pack away the leftover food and stuff the dishes into the sink.

"Today was actually pretty fun," Aoko tells them all afterwards, as she hands everyone their respective Japanese futons. "Thank you guys for coming."

Kuroba looks pleased to hear it, and Saguru supposes he can let him have this one.

Anyway, Saguru had a pretty good time himself.

* * *

The Christmas Day heist goes about as well as could be expected.

Kid makes his flashy entrance, takes the jewel, and manages to escape through the crowd just past Koizumi. Somehow, this all manages to happen as Kuroba whines continually through all their earpieces, "Hurry up, guys, it's freezing up here!" Aoko's assigned wing gets bypassed entirely, and on her orders, everyone abandons their assigned positions in order to try and cut Kid off on the roof—where Kid greets them all with a shout of "Merry Christmas!", tosses the gem into Saguru's hands, and then leaps off the side of the building.

Aoko seethes and Koizumi runs her fingers through her hair as they watch a white hang glider rise above their viewing horizon and then fly off into the distance. The police apparently notice it too, judging from the sounds of mobilization for a chase coming from the entrance below, but they're wasting their time.

The hang glider's a decoy. Saguru knows that even before Kuroba pops up behind them all with a candy cane protruding out his mouth.

Saguru sighs. "And where exactly were you?"

"Gift shop. They were giving these out for free." Kuroba yanks a handful of similar candy canes out of his pocket and proffers them out. "You want one?"

Aoko and Koizumi clearly do, each taking one for themselves. Saguru sighs to himself helplessly before following their lead.

Oh well. Maybe next time.


End file.
